I Am Not a Brain Surgeon

May 27th, 2018

Not so many years ago, I was a tender young singer/songwriter with dreams of the big time. This was long before I’d internalized Christine Lavin’s observation that there are literally hundreds of dollars to be made in folk music. Truth be told, it wasn’t the money I was after – it was the adulation of millions of adoring fans, or, well, enough adoring fans to fill a small coffeehouse on a regular basis. Had I known how complicated that is, I would have taken the easy way out and become a brain surgeon.

It’s a ton of work, this becoming slightly famous thing, in case you haven’t tried it yourself. It takes talent (got that), hard work (erm, I’ll get back to you there), and the courage to promote yourself (and this is where the throwing up my hands and becoming a brain surgeon part comes in). And it also takes time – the hours to marinate in the company of your peers, and the humility to learn something from them. When I was first starting out, lots of people were kind enough to take me aside and give me priceless advice, people who had been doing this for a long time and knew where the shortcuts where and, more important, where there weren’t any shortcuts. And, a lot of the time (not all the time, but enough), I shut my mouth and listened.

Time passes. Hair grays. And imperceptibly, you become the one of the old folks, the ones who know how it’s done. Which brings me, both selfishly and admiringly, to Prateek Poddar.

I’ve known Prateek for several years now. He’s been showing up at open mikes and working his craft. When he started out, he was pretty raw, but he’s got a gift for roots songwriting, and by now, he’s a great, gritty musician who knows his way around a song and a stage. We’ve talked many times about music and songwriting. And a couple months ago, I was getting a sandwich at Iggy’s (one of the world’s great bakeries, for all you gluten lovers out there), and someone waved tentatively at me from across the parking lot, and it was Prateek, because, well, you never recognize anyone out of context – sort of like seeing your dentist at a baseball game. In any case, we got to talking, and he said, and I kvell as I type this, “You know, you made a hell of an impression on me.”

Li’l ol’ me. Just this guy, doing his thing over and over again, and now I make impressions on people I admire. It’s not the main stage at SXSW, but I’ll take it. Being an old folk who know’s how it’s done, that is.

Prateek is walking the walk, music-wise. In May, he headlined at the Lizard Lounge, which is a pretty big deal here in the People’s Republic of Cambridge. Then, he discovered that he was a finalist in the New Folk competition at Kerrville, which is da bomb, for those of you who aren’t in the know. And – and this is the biggest deal of all – he’s decided to do music full-time. Remember all the work I said you have to do? The best way to do it is to make sure you have to, and I couldn’t be prouder of him.

So, I like to think, there are little ways that I’ve paid forward the debt that people paid forward to me. And, along the way, I’ve become one of those old folks who know how it’s done. And that’s worth a bit more to me than the literally hundreds of dollars that you can make in folk music.

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